


Man in the Mirror

by Cousin Shelley (CousinShelley)



Category: Mr. Robot (TV)
Genre: Fandom Stocking 2017, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Mindfuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-08
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-03-02 11:00:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13316712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CousinShelley/pseuds/Cousin%20Shelley
Summary: Elliot doesn't remember the last several hours. Mr. Robot fills in the blanks.





	Man in the Mirror

**Author's Note:**

  * For [boywonder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boywonder/gifts).



> I'm really sorry you didn't get anything fannish in your stocking last year. I hope you get at least a few fannish things this year to make up for it!

Hi. I’m glad you’re still with me.

I need your help. Have you been watching? He took over again, didn’t he? I don’t know how I got here, in my bathroom, or what I’ve been doing. The last thing I remember was a phone call from Angela. I was going to meet her--

“Elliot?”

Tyrell Wellick. Why is he in my apartment?

“Elliot, did I do something wrong?”

Did he? And what _is_ wrong in the context of the wrongness the world has become? The wrongness I helped bring about?

_Why is he here?_

“Because I invited him.” Mr. Robot’s voice sounded from the corner. Elliot spun, and the familiar figure in his glasses, jacket and hat stepped forward, arms crossed. He tilted his head toward the door and raised his voice. “You didn’t do anything wrong, Tyrell. Give me a few minutes of privacy, okay?”

“Okay.” Tyrell’s voice was tight, and an image of what he must look like on the other side of the door flashed into Elliot’s mind. Mouth drawn almost to a pucker, brows raised, nostrils flared. A tiny nod. “Okay.” Maybe a press of his hand to the door before he walked away.

What the—

“Why would you invite him here?” Elliot asked. “He's--”

“I know exactly what he is, Elliot. He’s been part of our plan from the beginning, and we still need him.”

“That doesn’t mean he has to be in my apartment,” Elliot ground out. “It’s . . .” Dark outside. As fucked up as Elliot’s internal clock was, he knew it wasn’t just late evening or early morning. The pull of sleep was like a rough, heavy blanket dragging against his brain.

“Why is he here in the middle of the night? You invited him to stay here?”

“I did.” Mr. Robot turned and stepped away, pacing as much as possible in the claustrophobic room. “He’s a loose cannon, Elliot. An unstable chemical in the mix. We’ve always been able to predict his reactions and his moods, but his obsession with you—he loves you, for god’s sake--has grown to the point that we can’t count on what we thought we knew. That means that we have to keep him closer than ever.”

Elliot shook his head, barely able to resist sinking both hands into his short hair and pulling. “You don’t get in a cage with a tiger to keep it from escaping the zoo.”

Mr. Robot smirked. “When I took you and Darlene to the zoo, the tiger was always your favorite. She liked the monkeys, but you, you always leaned too close to the tiger’s enclosure, on your tip-toes, like you could tumble in any second. You were an odd kid, Elliot. You might have curled up with one if I’d let you.”

Elliot’s mouth dropped open, but he couldn’t find the right word to argue with such a stupid—

“ _N_ o, you don’t crawl into the tiger’s cage, all right?” Mr. Robot nodded toward the mirror. “You sedate it. Or you keep it happy enough that it doesn’t want to break out anymore.”

Elliot turned and looked at himself. He was shirtless, small bruises dotting his chest and neck. His lips were darker than normal, slightly swollen, but not enough for a punch to have caused it.

He closed his eyes, and an image flashed before him, his own face staring into the mirror, Tyrell behind him, shirtless, soft purple bruises across his chest, one darker on his neck.

“This is so wrong,” Tyrell said. “You should never have had to live this way, in such a hovel.” He swiped his hand over the mirror, frowning at their crackled, clouded reflection. “Soon things will be different, Elliot. You’ll see. We’ll live like the kings, the gods, that we are.”

Tyrell leaned in and kissed Elliot’s neck. Elliot watched his own hand slide up to Tyrell’s nape, watched himself lean into the kiss, tilt his head and gasp. With the hand at Tyrell's neck, he slowly pushed him to his knees. 

“No.” Elliot’s knuckles and fingertips ached where he gripped the edge of the sink. He hung his head, shaking it. “This is _my_ body. You can't just . . . I—I don’t want this.”

“Believe me, you did. You do. You want lots of things Elliot, lots of things you can’t face or admit to yourself, from the fall of Evil Corp to your maniac partner in crime who’s waiting in the other room. Things that, thanks to me, you have the luxury of regretting or outright forgetting. Good thing I’m here to help you, isn’t it?”

“You _can’t_ use me this way.” His voice shook like electricity jumping a wire.

A hand dropped onto his shoulder, pulling him upright. “I’m not using you, Elliot.” 

Elliot opened his eyes. He was alone in the room, but Mr. Robot stared back at him and smiled with a head tilt and a wink. “I _am_ you, kiddo.”

He’s right, you know. Part of me refuses to believe it, but there’s no other explanation. They say a hypnotist can’t make a subject do anything they wouldn’t do under their own steam, so surely Mr. Robot can’t make me do anything I wouldn't do on my own. 

I say it in my head and to you, out loud, and part of me still rails against it. But I can feel lips against my neck and a hand on the small of my back, and you were there, you saw, didn’t you? I must have accepted it, enjoyed it, even if Mr. Robot was in control, because he is me, no matter how hard that is for me to face.

He’s lied to me before. But you were there, weren’t you, and you’d tell me if I had it all wrong?

Mr. Robot leaned toward the mirror, straightened the cap on his head, and flicked off the light as he left the room.


End file.
